These pictures are of the "New Fisics": FREE ENTERPRISES "orbital"
type hand / foot powered hydrofoil that won the U S national 100m sprint
competition in 1997. It is built mostly from parts that we have in stock!.

Races are also held in Japan and Europe. In Japan, the fastest
boat was probably "Cogito III"; in Europe, the fastest hydrofoil at
the 1997 international race was "AF Chapman". The world
record for human powered speed on the water is held by "Decavitator"
from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, led by Mark Drela. That boat
won the Du Pont prize by default with a speed of 18+ knots.

The first known human propelled hydrofoil device was
"Wasserlaufer" developped by Julius Shuck
from Germany in the early 1950s (first published in 1953 ?). The first time this webmaster
got a glimpse of it was while watching Howard Stern's movie "Gizmo" in 1983. This device saw the individual
work feet into sandals at the center of two frames with handlebars at top and submerged "T" hydrofoils below.
The "powersource" started by standing on these hydrofoil strut racks held relative to each other (i.e. so they
would not separate) by a line and resting firmly on the bottom.
In flight, the individual moved sideways leaning on a downward angled foil with one leg and "recovering" with a
lightly loaded upward angled foil attatched to the other leg. The motion of shifting weight from one side to the
other, stepping and recovering,
and shifting the foils' postion and attack angle via the handlebars allowed the person to move along at a pretty good
clip with stepping movements at apparently low power. This "father" of oscilating craft oscillated in 4 ways: person
weight-shifting from side to side, foil attack angle shifting,up and down stepping with each leg, shifting lines
of action of weight bearing foils.

At the time of this writing, there is a surge of oscillating powered craft which
would be the known or unknown proginy of Wasserlauffer. Some include the works of Parker MacCready (see below
); Trampofoil (Alexander Sahlen of Sweeden, mid 1990's) ; Aqua Skipper; Pumpabike, and others.

At this point it may be appropriate to discuss hydrofoil classes . There are two
main classes of human powered hidrofoil: Boats and non-boats. The devices just mentioned are non-boat while
something that can displace water at rest, i.e. *float* would be a boat. The Wasserlaufer started in shallow water
from rest on the river bottom and is a non-boat. The MacCready craft had floats and therefore are boats. Trampofoil, Aquaskipper,
Pumpabike start from a dock, and on rare occasions from a beach or by being pulled, therefore they are as non-boat
as a pair of water skis. Speaking of skis, air chair, and associated surfing hydrofoils are non-boat. Some of the
early Flying Fish as well as recent pedal powered hydrofoil runs are without hulls and therefore non-boat.

The first pedal powered hydrofoil to fly was probably the "Flying Fish"; It was essentially
a bicycle with foils instead of wheels. It had no floats at first, and was
launched off a pier on rails. Their flight was first published in 1984. If
your PC can run this old video, the "Flying Fish"link below will show the essential
components of all hydrofoil research. . .GETTING DUMPED !! That's
Allan Abbott on the hydrofoil, and probably Alec Brooks doing the "rip
cord".

The second viable pedaled machine and first hydrofoil 'boat' (that is floating and taking off from the
water), "Hydroped" , was operated by Sid Shutt and
began life as a kayak with a patented "shuttstrut " attitude foil in
the front, and a main surface piercing foil in the center. Sid had been working
on hydrofoil sailboats since the '60's

The third boat probably to ever achieve flight was "Foiled again" (shown
below) by David Owers last known to be from West Wimbledon , England (Dave,
if you see this get in touch!). It also was a converted kayak, except that
it used submerged foils instead of surface piercing. His first published
flight was in 1986.
In that same year, "Mutiny on the boundry layer" was flown ("flapped" -as it was the first to use pedals and
flapping wing technology instead of propeller) at the expo86 IHPSC in Vancouver. The developer was
Parker McCready (offspring of Kremmer Prize winning Paul). This machine was developped into "Pogofoil" which
was the first up and down oscilating flapping hydrofoil. While a boat (it had floats), it is the progenator
of Trampofoil, Aquaskipper, Pumpabike, and other like non-boat craft. The lightness afforded by not having to
carry float systems is certainly envied by the boat folks while the ability to stay dry at deep water landings
and do deep water starts must be envied by the non-boat folks.

REFERENCES & LINKS

hydrofoil history-by project

Attempted list of the first hand-full of human powered hydrofoil flights
(watch for updates and improvements in accuracy) boat/ inventor/date: